She Can Love You Too
by orangeflavor
Summary: No, here was not Crystal Tokyo. That was a week ago. The day they buried the Queen.


Disclaimer: I own nothing, I make no money.

Author's Note: This scene had been festering in my mind for a couple months now and even though I never write Sailor Moon fanfiction I had to do it. This is set after Crystal Tokyo with a couple of my own interpretations. Also, I apologize for some of the westernizations (specifically the food) but again, this is under my interpretation of the future's events. I hope it is believable. Please enjoy.

She Can Love You Too

_"No, here was not Crystal Tokyo. That was a week ago. The day they buried the Queen."_

She watched as he dragged his fork lightly across his plate. He dabbed at the eggs, pushed the cold hash browns around the plate. She held her own fork stiffly in her hand.

He was staring at the plate before him, dark hair hanging down over his forehead so that she couldn't see his eyes. His shoulders were still as straight and broad as she'd ever seen them, his back stiff against the chair. He had the sleeves of his button-down rolled up to his elbows and his other hand rested in his lap.

He hadn't said a word to her for two days. He hadn't said a word to anyone.

Chibiusa glanced back down at her own untouched plate and sighed. She put her fork down on the thin white tablecloth and looked to the windows at her side.

This was not Crystal Tokyo. She didn't think she could walk the halls of the palace so easily anymore. The royal suites and chambers were cages to her now, the crystal walls and iridescent staircases, the colored-glass window panes, all ridiculously useless to her now.

No, here was not Crystal Tokyo. That was a week ago. The day they buried the Queen.

Chibiusa sat at the small white-iron porch table at the center of the room. All around her were the glass walls facing the east side of the house. There were hanging plants and shelves of flowers and blossoms she couldn't begin to name. Her mother's flowers. The room was filled with them, the plants filtering the light of the dawning sun through the glass panes to rest in orange beams across her face, no warmer to her then the memory of her mother's garden. Through the glass she can see the yard stretching out past the back of the house, past the swinging bench and the large Poinciana tree scattering red blossoms along the grass.

She hadn't been here in years, not since her mother was pregnant with Chibiusa's youngest sister. Two other siblings had been born before that and during each pregnancy this was her mother's sanctuary. It was a two-story wood house built on the edge of a small Corsican town, just down the length of a minor inlet beach. Her parents had bought it just before she herself was born, almost as an escape for the Queen from political court while she carried. The King would stay with them there sometimes, but mostly, it was for the Queen and her children. In Chibiusa's entire twenty-eight years she has yet to find a place that reminded her so much of her mother. In twenty-eight years she can't remember being anywhere that smelled so strongly of her, that kept her touch even in the walls. This was the living house of her mother.

She had been here for two days now and still silence.

Now in her twenties, and a sailor soldier in her own right, Chibiusa was stationed at Crystal Tokyo with two of her three siblings. Her brother Momoru and sister Itsuko were sailor soldiers of the Royal Guard. Her other sister Reii was a Lunar Diplomat. The palace of Crystal Tokyo was at the center of the senshi family and it was there that a week ago the formal ceremony of the Queen's funeral took place.

Chibiusa would later learn that her mother knew all along the consequences of passing the Silver Crystal to the next generation.

The Silver Crystal in itself cannot survive or generate any sort of power. A host is needed to become the crystal's channel, and in establishing this path of power there is made an irreversible tie between the two. As the crystal is passed from generation to generation of moon family so too passes the former wielder. And though the Queen had said her quiet goodbyes and silently prepared for her departure from the world, the others had not. The King had begged her to postpone the Passing for a few more years but she had calmly replied that it was the crystal's choice and not the wielder's. It was her time.

After the funeral, the King was not seen for days and when her siblings came to her with their worries Chibiusa thought of the only place she could possibly find him. She arrived on the porch of the Corsican home two days ago. There her father had silently opened the door before staring at her for several seconds and then walking back into the house, leaving the door open for her to enter. She had grabbed her bag off the porch wood and stepped inside, closing the door behind her. In those two days, though she had tried on several occasions to get her father to eat or speak, he hardly did more than sit outside the porch or in the glass garden. She was beginning to hate the silence.

There was a light noise from her left and Chibiusa turned her head to glance back at the table before her, her thoughts pulling back from the glass walls around her. She watched as her father began to slowly try to pick up a piece of hash brown she had cooked for him. He fumbled with the fork at first, as though he had not used one before, until he managed to get it through the prongs and then into his mouth.

Chibiusa watched silently as he took the first few bites she'd seen him eat in days and suddenly he glanced up, his blue eyes finding hers instantly, and she almost sucked in a breath.

He stopped chewing, and straightened up to face her evenly.

She leaned toward him, cocking her head slightly. "Father?"

He stared at her for a moment, and then, almost imperceptibly he nodded at her plate. "Your food will get cold."

Chibiusa stared at him, her throat steadily getting heavier with the weight of silence. She cleared her throat, forced air through the channels. "What?"

Mamoru looked at her again and suddenly she couldn't recognize this man, this hollowed out husk of a husband. His eyes would catch hers but she had the distinct feeling he wasn't even in the room.

"Your food will get cold," he repeated.

She felt the sting of salt against the corners of her eyes, then blinked furiously, refusing to acknowledge them. "Father." It had come out as a croak. She swallowed thickly, placing a hand on the table, hoping to catch his attention. "Father." This time her voice was firmer.

"Yes?" His hand laid limp across the table, his fork left forgotten in the potatoes. "What's wrong, Chibiusa?"

She couldn't recognize this man.

She frowned, clamping her teeth together. Slowly, she pushed up from the white-iron chair and crossed over to him, kneeling beside him. His eyes didn't even follow her.

She reached across him and grabbed one of his hands. "Father, you know where you are, right?"

Mamoru quirked a small smile, almost imperceptibly. "Of course, Chibiusa. I'm with your mother."

Chibiusa felt her fingers start to shake. "No, Father." She gripped his hands tighter, hoping to stop the trembling. If she could only stop the trembling. "You know what happened to Mother." She could feel the words catching in her throat, the way they dragged across her tongue with the difficulty of saying them, of believing them, of ever imagining their truth. "Mother's…" she shut her eyes. "Father, please don't make me say it."

Mamoru sat still, staring at the place she was previously sitting, his eyes immobile. He cocked his head slightly in question. "What is it, Chibiusa? What's wrong?

The scent of her mother's hibiscus drifted to her nose and she had to shut her eyes once more, expel a heavy breath into the air to push the smell away, push the memory away. She reopened her eyes, fluttering her lids against the growing sun and she glanced out the window at the Poinciana tree down the yard.

She watched the red flowers drift to the floor.

"Mother's dead. We buried her."

Mamoru furrowed his brow. "What are you talking about, Chibiusa?"

Chibiusa shook her head. Her knees were growing sore from the tile beneath her. "She's not here, Father…she…" Before she could hold herself back she felt the crack in her voice, the shake of air that breached her steady words. Her tears were hot against her lids. She bit back a sob, her teeth sinking into her lip and she'd never felt the weight of the Silver Crystal like she had now. It rested in her pocket, nestling between the folds of her dress and it felt like a chain she'd been carrying around her neck for millennia.

"She's with me, Chibiusa. I can smell her." He drew in a breath, the aroma of baby's breath and water blossoms and wild orchids settling around him.

She looked up at him through the wetness of her eyes, looked at his dry ones, at his set jaw and slack lips. And then she felt the slight pull of anger at the back of her heart, because how could he not be dealing with this pain? It's all she ever did nowadays. She clenched her teeth, curled her fingers into her palms. "Look at me," she bit out.

How dare he? How dare he leave her here like this?

Chibiusa knelt on the floor of her mother's glass garden with the guilt of her passing and her father couldn't even share her tears.

"God…it's not fair." She found herself shaking uncontrollably, her chest heaving with breaths. "It's not fair that I have to miss her like this." She could hear her voice rising but she didn't care. She didn't care at all. Why couldn't she hear her? "Look at me," she demanded, louder this time.

She needed for him to look at her, but he could barely lift his head. "It's not fair. It's not fair!" She raised her hands to her ears. "I need you here right now, Father," she screamed at him, gripping his arm. She shook him, but he didn't even seem to notice. He didn't see the tears, the hot, angry tears pouring down her cheeks. He couldn't see the rage in her eyes. He couldn't see the force in her chest that was heaving with desperation. And he couldn't see the want, the want for it all to end, for him to _just look at her_.

She shook him again, her fingers clenching his white skin beneath her hands but he stayed still. He stayed silent. Her nails were digging half-moons into his skin. "I need you to be with _me_! I can't do this alone!"

Because he didn't know. He just didn't know, and she didn't know how to show him.

"Look at me! Why won't you look at me Father!" She couldn't stop the tears and she felt so _angry_ with him for not understanding. _Why_ couldn't he just _understand_?

Mamoru's dark hair fell back in front of his eyes but his hands stayed limp in his lap. He didn't even register the pain of Chibiusa's shakes, of her throbbing, of her violent sobs.

And she was, she was sobbing so hard, heaving such labored breathes. She was in pain. Her chest…was in so much pain. She wrenched a hand from his arm and clutched at her chest. "HOW COULD YOU LEAVE ME LIKE THIS!"

And that was it. Without warning Mamoru turned his head to stare at his daughter, her cheeks red with the shrieks, her eyes leaking tears down to her collar. She sucked in a breath, stilled her thrashing and for a moment she foolishly thought he might have heard her.

Slowly, he raised cold fingers to trace her cheek, and the shock of his touch made her flinch involuntarily. But she couldn't move. She couldn't reach up and grip his hand, couldn't move herself to wrap arms around his thinning frame, couldn't register anything but the blue of his irises.

"It's okay," he whispered, so softly she had to strain to her it. He pause for a moment, and she almost let herself take a breath when he continued. "She can love you too."

Something in Chibiusa died at that moment, something that had managed, somehow, to make it out of her mother's memory alive. Inside she felt it crack, fracture, until she felt herself drifting away from her body, disconnecting from whatever ties she had left in this place. She couldn't speak, because words were useless now. She looked in on herself and she couldn't recognize this woman, this hollowed-out husk of a daughter.

She hung her head, a low dark laugh falling from her lips.

It was then that she realized there was a place in her father's heart that her mother had always held, a hole that Chibiusa would never be able to fill. And there was a part of her father that now, neither of them, would ever, ever be able to take back.


End file.
